


Ships That Don't Come In

by Kelticmoon



Series: Fixit Series compliant fics [7]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Keith (Voltron) Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-31
Updated: 2020-03-31
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:42:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23402419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kelticmoon/pseuds/Kelticmoon
Summary: When Keith disappears for a few days, Lance, Shiro, and Krolia go looking for him.
Relationships: Keith & Lance (Voltron), Keith & Lance friendship (voltron), Keith/Shiro (Voltron)
Series: Fixit Series compliant fics [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1507331
Comments: 3
Kudos: 58





	Ships That Don't Come In

**Author's Note:**

> It’s supposed to take place before they find Luca but after everyone’s recovered from the robeast explosion.  
> I have a headcanon that Keith’s dad listened to country music a lot when he was alive.  
> Keith needs a hug  
> Also foreshadowing for my FixIt Series

Keith is standing with Kosmo at his side as Pidge shows him, Shiro, Lance, Allura, and Hunk around her Dad's lab. 

She’s excitedly showing them some of the things she’s been working on as her music plays in the background.

“Oh, and get this! The Olkari showed me how to recreate their plant weapon technology with our own! I’m working on a way to use it to upgrade our Paladin armor!”

“That’s awesome, Pidge,” Shiro tells her.

“It always amazes me how well you’re able to integrate different technologies together,” Allura tells her with a smile.

Pidge grins at the compliment.

“Oh! Wait until you see the new upgrade for my holo-glove!”

As she leads them toward a testing area, Keith hears the opening cords to an old country song and freezes in his tracks.

Kosmo looks up at him and whines.

Keith takes a sharp intake of breath through his nose.

~

_Suddenly he’s 4 years old being pushed in a tire swing by his dad as the song plays from an old broke down car stereo system. Then he’s five and they’re in the kitchen washing and drying the dishes and his dad is singing along to the same song. Then, he’s six and roughhousing with his dad in the front yard again when the song begins and by the end of it they’re both laying on their backs in the yard laughing and looking up at the stars._

_Several other memories of his father listening to the song flash in his mind in short succession from his earliest memory to right up to his last memory of his father before he died._

_~_

Alarmed barking cuts through the flashback and Keith slams back to present with a gasp, stumbling backward.

“Whoa! Keith!”

Someone catches his right arm and steadies him.

“Hey man, are you ok?”

Still shaken and breathing heavy from his flashback, his vision clears just enough to see Lance is the one who steadied him. Kosmo is standing in front of him with his head in Keith’s face licking it. As his vision clears more, he can make out Allura and Shiro standing just behind Kosmo with Hunk and Pidge right behind them, all with concerned looks on their faces. 

Then he notices the song again and can feel another flashback coming on.

Frantic, he wordlessly hugs Kosmo. 

Kolivan and Krolia walk in just in time to see them teleport out of the lab.

“What was that about?” Kolivan asks with a raised eyebrow.

“Your guess is as good as ours, man,” Hunk says, worriedly.

“It looked like he suddenly had a flashback,” Pidge states. “And it looked like he was about to have another one right before he left.

Krolia notices the song playing and immediately recognizes it. 

“Was this song playing?” Krolia asks them calmly pointing to the speaker.

“It was,” Shiro confirms.

Then it dawns on him. 

“Right when the flashbacks started.”

“You think the song was triggering them?” Lance asks.

“I am more concerned about where he fled,” Allura states.

“I know where he’s going…” Krolia states calmly. “I recommend giving him some time. He may return on his own.”

She turns then and walks out the door. 

~

However when Keith isn’t seen anywhere for all of the next day and half of the day after, they grow concerned.

“I checked the shack,” Shiro states. “No luck.”

“He’s not in his quarters or the Lion hanger,” Allura says.

“Where could he have gone?” Pidge wonders.

Krolia appears then.

“I know where he’s gone…”

They look up at her.

“Where?” Lance asks.

“It’s a place not far from the shack.”

Krolia turns to leave. 

They move to follow her, but Kolivan stops them.

“Not in this number.”

His tone brooked no argument.

“Shiro and Lance should go with Krolia,” Allura states calmly. “Pidge, Kolivan, Hunk, and I will remain here in case he returns.”

Shiro and Lance hurry to catch up to Krolia just as she reaches a hoverbike just outside the Atlas. 

“I assume one of you can drive this?” Krolia asks them.

“I’ve got it.”

The three of them climb on with Shiro driving.

“Where exactly are we going anyway?” Lance asks.

“Somewhere with deeper meaning to Keith. As I said before, it’s not far from the shack. I’ll tell you how to get there.”

As they speed through the desert, Lance asks.

“So what’s the deal with Keith and that song?”

“I remember his father often listened to songs like it when we met. I imagine Keith heard them a lot before his father died.”

“Keith was 7 when his father died, right?” Shiro asks. “He was a fireman who died on the job?”

“That’s right,” Krolia confirms.

They drive through the desert until they reach an old farmhouse with a barn and tree broken in half in the front yard with the remains of a tire swing beside it. Lance looks around and spots the shack across a large field of sand. They could walk there from here if they wanted. The fact that the only visible damage is the broken tree is kind of a miracle.

As they dismount, Shiro points toward the dust at their feet.

“Foot prints. He’s definitely been here.”

They walk up to the front porch.

“What is this place?” Lance asks.

“This is where Keith grew up before his father died,” Krolia explains. “I doubt he’s been back here much since.”

“So where do we look?” Shiro asks.

“This is where my expertise comes to an end,” Krolia states plainly. “Keith grew up here, not I. He likely knows this place better than I do so he could literally be anywhere.”

They enter the farmhouse into a living room with an old fireplace with pictures lining the mantle. There are pictures of Keith and an older man who could only be his father until Keith was about the same age as Lance's niece or nephew.

The picture in the center is missing.

“He was in here at some point,” Krolia observes.

“Why are these even still here?” Lance asks. "Wouldn't he have brought them with him?"

There's a bitter tone in Shiro's voice as he speaks.

“Social services wouldn’t let him. Said it would “remind him of the past” and “scare away potential families” so they made him leave them.”

The very notion deeply offends Lance.

“Fucking seriously?!”

“Right?!”

Krolia smiles.

“Focus, boys.”

The three of them wander upstairs.

Krolia disappears into a room with an opened door to the left of the stairs as Lance and Shiro see an opened door across the hall from it with the word “Keith” written on it and wander in. 

They see a simple twin bed with space ships on the bedding. Posters of jet planes, space, and Garrison mission crews for various space missions line the walls, and on the ceiling over the bed are glow-in-the-dark stars.

“My sister and I had a similar bedrooms. Only, instead of planes we had pictures of…”

Lance trails off when he looks at Shiro.

He sees an expression that has nothing to do with him and everything to do with Keith. 

Lance wanders quietly down the backstairs to leave Shiro to his thoughts.

As he’s walking into the kitchen, he hears music playing.

“Hey, does anyone else hear that music?” Lance calls up the stairs.

He walks outside and across the farm to the old, worn out barn following the music. 

He wanders in the door and spots an old broken down car inside with music playing from the radio inside; country music like the song that was playing in the Holt’s lab.

Now that he’s close enough to hear, he can make out words.

_“So, here’s to all the soldiers… who have ever died in vain…”_

He walks aimlessly around the center aisle and is about to give up when he spots something blue in the loft. 

_“…the insane locked up in themselves… the homeless down on main…”_

Mind racing, he quickly climbs the ladder.

_“To those who stand on empty shores and spit against the wind…”_

There he finds Keith laying on his back across one of the cross beams in the barn with his head toward the center aisle. Kosmo lays loyally in the loft nearby. Held in his arms lying face down against his chest is the missing picture frame.

_“And those who wait forever… for ships that don’t come in…”_

Lance almost says something but then he notices the tear tracks running down the side of Keith’s face and thinks better of it. 

Quietly, he sits on the edge of the loft near where Keith is laying and just waits.

_“He said, it’s only life’s illusions… that lead us to this bar…”_

Seconds tick by as Lance sits in the loft with Keith. A warm desert breeze blows through the barn as they sit. 

_“To pick up these old crutches… and compare each other’s scars…”_

Lance has to admit, it’s peaceful. 

“There was a traveling carnival or something that came to town every couple of years or so…”

Lance jumps when Keith starts to speak.

“The only time we were able to go was when I was six… Dad took me on any ride I wanted… played any game I wanted… We didn’t leave until very late… I fell asleep as he carried me back to the car… there was a balloon tied to my wrist and a hippo under one of my arms I got from one of the carnival games…”

_“Cause the things we’re calling heartache…Hell, they’re hardly worth our time…”_

Lance sits quietly and listens as Keith talks.

_“We bitch about a dollar… when there are those without a dime…”_

He spots Shiro and Krolia wandering into the center aisle of the barn. When they see him, Lance silently puts a finger over his lips before pointing to the beam beside him. Shiro heads straight for the ladder while Krolia stays down on the ground, content that they found him.

_“And as he ordered one last round he said… I guess we can’t complain…”_

Shiro sits beside Lance on the edge of the loft as Keith continues talking about his dad.

_“God made life a gamble… and we’re still in the game.”_

“I haven’t thought about any of this in years…after all the years I was in foster care… guess I forgot… but when I heard that song though, it all came back to me…”

He looks at Lance and Shiro then. 

“I know I’ve been here a few days… I just… I couldn’t…” 

He takes a shuttery breath as he looks back up at the ceiling. 

“Right now, I don’t want to be the Black Paladin, Leader of Voltron, a Blade of Marmora, Garrison's Pilot Prodigy, or …”

Keith stops a moment before continuing.

“I just wanted be Keith. No one else… just Keith…”

Lance sees Shiro swallow silently out of the corner of his eye as he feels a lump in his own throat. Neither of them speaks, mutually agreeing to let Keith have this.

_“…And those who wait forever… For ships that don’t come in.”_

**Author's Note:**

> I know I said I was on hiatus and I still am, but I needed to work through some emotions right now so, here it is. I’ve actually been sitting on this one for a while, but now it’s an outlet for a recent celebrity death that has struck a chord with me.  
> For those who aren't country music fans or haven’t been following country music news like I have, Joe Diffie died from the Coronavirus. I grew up during the 90s when his songs were popular. I have a lot of happy memories growing up of visiting my grandma’s house (grandma always had country music playing) and hearing it and many other 90s country songs play.


End file.
